12 Angry Men | Critique

12 men, 1 room, one table, 12 chairs & 96 minutes of cinema & that too in black & white!… now how does that sound to you??!!

To be very frank, it sounded very boring to me, when I was first told about it by a friend of mine. I thought that I would end up mocking the film & those who tried to make it! But it ended in a completely opposite manner. I was spellbound by the intensity & the depth of the movie. Not for even a single second was I in a mood to leave it. In fact I delayed all my works to finish this one!

‘12 angry men’ basically deals with a jury of 12 men who are into giving a decision against life or death of a boy who is accused of killing his father, believing certain witnesses. The condition is that the jury will come to a decision only when all of them abide to a single decision. Initially, only a single juror supports the child, focusing on the fact that it is a matter of life & death, so the case should be discussed upon once again. But as the movie progresses certain facts are brought into focus that defy that the boy is a killer & question the authenticity of the proofs. Finally, all the 12 jurors accept that the boy is not a killer & give the decision “not guilty”!

There are two big facts associated with this movie –

1. Only 8 minutes of the movie comprise of scenes outside the room. (that includes a courtroom scene & a washroom scene)

2. Apart from two jurors leaving the room, only three names are being used throughout the movie – ‘the boy’, ‘the old man’, & ‘the lady across the street’.

The two reasons that have made me a big fan of this flick, & have brought it in the list of my all time favorite movies.

It is an adaptation of a play by ‘Reginald Rose’, of the same name. The movie basically indulges itself into a clash of conservative & non-conservative ideologies & the simplicity in which it is presented is marvelous. With no fancy sets to supports, the movie completely depends upon the acting of the leads. However, the hero of the movie turns out to be its script & screenplay, by “Reginald Rose”, along with the fabulous direction by “Sidney Lumet”. The story begins as a simple murder case but gradually begins to unfold the underlying truths & the logics behind the innocence of the accused, & the drama that surrounds the logics & the decisions of the jurors. It very clearly demonstrates the fact that a person’s decisions can be biased & unfair because of the miss-happenings that have occurred to him in the past & how he becomes blind because of it.

It has also been remade in India as “Ek ruka hua faisla” , directed by “Basu Chatterjee”, in 1986.

Written by Rishabh Shukla